Don't be afraid to take that path (and look down every once in a while)
Even though I finished work on my new book, ideas are still swirling around in my head. This morning, I thought about how it all had started: the review I wrote of Masahisa Fukase's Family book, which had been re-issued by MACK. At the time, I wasn't a fan of the photographer. In particular, I thought (and still think) that his well-known Ravens was massively overrated. This wasn't (and isn't) a very popular opinion in photoland, and I knew a number of people were mad at me for voicing it.
The year before Family came out, and a Japanese photographer friend who knew of what I thought of Fukase showed me a book of his that I had never heard of before. It was called Memories of Father, and it had been published in 1991. That book blew me away. Ravens (or as it would turn out Family) had nothing on Memories of Father. The latter really was a deeply heartfelt book in the way that the two others simply are not.
But even before seeing it, I had had my misgivings about Ravens. It's not that it's a bad book. No, it's a perfectly good book. It's good for teaching, too. But it's simply not the masterpiece it is made out to be. Ignoring the fact that photoland's official back story is completely inaccurate (the bulk of the book was photographed before the divorce, and it had been published in a number of separate articles in Japanese photography magazines), it's not as deep as people want you to believe.
The official story is this: Fukase got divorced and was so distraught over this that he took a train back home (to Japan's most northernmost major island, Hokkaido) and took these moody pictures. Even before I knew that the story was mostly wrong (he did get divorced, but he had already photographed most of the pictures; also he had been a total jerk to his wife, who divorced him because of that), what bothered me was this idea of masculinity it painted: the tortured male, rejected by his wife, is now embracing his inner pain and shows it to us so forcefully.
Really? That's it?
This is what bothers me: It's the pretty ubiquitous idea that a man can only embrace his innermost mental life in the most extreme of circumstances, and when he does it comes out in this expressionistic fashion. That might be the case for a lot of men. But for sure it's not the case for me. In fact, where I'm coming from (and by this I mean my own mental composition) expressionism is not an expression of the pain (which for sure is real) but of the fact that under regular circumstances so many men are so far removed from their own emotions that they can't express them.
The reality is that I had a somewhat uncomfortable adolescence because I just couldn't and wouldn't conform with what boys were (and still are supposed to do). I wasn't interested in sports (soccer), and I still am not. I wasn't interested in the typical male bonding experiences (and I still am not). This made me weird for most of my peers (I'm afraid it still does). I think I lucked out that I grew up in West Germany and not in the US where I'm sure I would have been relentlessly bullied by the "jocks".
My own reality is that there are straight heterosexual men who don't conform to the standard model of how men are supposed to behave and act, and they find it very hard to fit in.
I remember a few years ago, an acquaintance invited me to a baseball game (Red Sox at Boston's Fenway Park), joining his son and a friend. I decided to go (it was and will remain my only baseball game -- it's freakishly boring). The whole trip and game I felt like I was acting. I had talked myself into believing that I needed to have this (very American) experience. But I didn't enjoy any of it, especially not the "guy talk" about the game and the various rituals (such as the mock outrage when some guy who gets paid a lot of money doesn't hit a small ball with a large wooden stick). At the end of that day, I hated myself for having been a part of that.
Obviously, the struggle I'm speaking of cannot be compared to what anyone else has to go through, dealing with expressions of standard Western masculinity (women, members of the LGBTQ community). I got away pretty easy. I'm not discriminated against, and I don't have opportunities denied to me simply because I'm different.
This thought had me wonder whether I should even write a book about male photographers and their fathers.
Well, now I did. In part, I wrote it for me. This might sound selfish, and it is selfish in the way that all art is selfish: you struggle with something that is of extreme importance for you. If all goes well your struggle takes you to a new place in your life. That is the form of artistic success that I've always been stressing when asked by students: if a piece of art (or writing) has allowed you to gain deeper insight in your life, that is the success you really want to be striving for. Everything else is a bonus, whether it's a published book, a gallery exhibition, an award, whatever else.
Given that we all struggle with life in one way or another, it's almost inevitable that someone will connect with what you've made. This is, after all, the reason how and why art works and how and why it's so magical. A complete stranger might know or feel exactly what has been moving you so deeply.
This inevitably is a leap of faith, the idea that this will happen, and it's a terrifying spot to be in: you don't know whether it's going to happen until it does.
Here I am then, terrified at the idea of having just written about male photographers (including myself) dealing with their fathers in a world that needs to hear less from men and more from other voices. But there also is that fact that all the talk of toxic masculinity has affected those men (like me) who don't and can't conform with societal standards of masculinity, regardless of their sexual orientation.
There also is the fact that photoland is filled with ideas and examples that reflect a very bad idea of masculinity (in 2018 I wrote about photography's macho cult). From the above, I might be clear how I'm feeling that I have a stake in breaking that up.
Right now, I don't even have a publisher, so I don't know why I'm still thinking about all of this. In fact, I didn't even plan to write this email. I thought I'd just jot down a quick note about Fukase, to possibly edit (or delete) later. But if there's one thing I've learned about creativity it is this: it might offer you a path where and when you don't expect it. Don't be afraid to take that path. More often than not, it will lead you to a very good spot.
With that, I'm going to conclude today. I hope you're going to enjoy your weekend. As always thank you for reading!
-- Jörg
PS: That picture at the top -- I had walked by the little tree many, many times before. It was only the other day that I realized what kind of tree it is. I crouched down to take the picture. Looking means: looking and looking again. The hundredth time you might see something you've never seen before.